[23] Le Départ du Roi Constantin, pp. 26-7.
[24] The Weekly Dispatch, 17 June, 1917.
[25] Le Départ du Roi Constantin, pp. 30-1.
[26] M. Jonnart, in The Times, 11 July, 1917.
[27] Le Départ du Roi Constantin, p. 34.
[28] The Weekly Dispatch, 17 June, 1917.
[29] Jonnart, p. 128.
[30] Of all English newspapers the Weekly Dispatch (17 June, 1917) alone gave some account of this last scene of the drama. The rest atoned for their self-denial in narrative by proportionate self-indulgence in comment. One of them described the coup as "a distinct gain both to our interests in the East and to our moral position in the world." British agents on the spot must have been strangely blind to this aspect of the business; for General Sarrail complains that the coup succeeded in spite of the obstacles raised "by our allies, the English. It was à contre-coeur that 500 of their men were furnished me for the descent on Thessaly. The Chief of the British Staff, no doubt by order, sought to learn my plans that he might telegraph them and ruin our action, etc."—Sarrail, p. 242. Without for a moment accepting the French General's suggestions of British double-dealing, we have every reason to believe that he was right in the view that the disgraceful affair did not enjoy British official sympathy.
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